Working Through the Unimaginable
by savvyliterate
Summary: "I look at my little girl and see her wandering further and further away from me, and I don't know how to bring her back." - Luke and Lorelai deal with Rory's news post-AYITL.


**Author's note:** We take a quick break from "If You Want More, Then Jump" to follow our newlyweds in the days after the end of AYITL. A Tumblr post on how it was disservice to Lorelai for the story to go full circle made me think on Rory's pregnancy, and a lot of stories tend to revolve around Rory's reaction to everything - not Lorelai and Luke's. This takes a look at things from their POV.

* * *

It wasn't lost on Lorelai that some of the biggest catastrophes in Rory's life coincided with the happiest moments in hers, and as a byproduct, Luke's. Their first kiss happened at the same time Rory had slept with a married Dean. Their first engagement happened the night Rory moved in with her grandparents. Not that the baby itself was a catastrophe, because babies were small and pink and goodness personified. But Rory's life itself, the steps she had taken to where she sat on the gazebo steps and told Lorelai she was pregnant, that was spiraling faster than toilet water after a good flush.

But Rory's news, surprisingly, did not ruin Lorelai's wedding day. Even she was shocked by it. But somehow, in the walk between the gazebo and the house, Lorelai managed to stuff the news in a box, then shove it in another box, then shoved it in a really, _really_ tiny box that was relegated to a corner of her mind, then locked away. She prided herself on being able to compartmentalize, but knew enough of herself after the disaster that was 2006-2007 that she wouldn't be able to do it long. She didn't need to do it for months. Just a single day.

So Lorelai went through the second wedding with genuine excitement and the sheer joy that was marrying the love of her life. It managed to outweigh the internal angst that her daughter provided. She and Luke married again, with April and Sookie and her mother all there. They danced, they ate, they sneaked away to consummate their marriage in the diner because they couldn't wait another second, they changed clothes and went back to the town square to keep celebrating, then went back to the house and collapsed on their bed before catching a very early morning flight for their honeymoon.

Rory had begged Lorelai as they left the gazebo not to tell anyone, but Lorelai hadn't responded. The events of the last year were far too fresh in her mind, and she wasn't going to spiral down the same path a third time. She _was_ going to tell her husband, and if Rory wasn't happy about it, tough. Part of her did a rebellious little jig at that. So, sitting in the first class seats her mother insisted on paying for (and Lorelai didn't object because she really didn't want to fly to Italy in coach), she took that little box from the corner of her mind and carefully peeled back one flap.

Before she could begin to formulate how to even begin the discussion, she felt Luke's hand close over hers and squeeze tightly. She glanced up to see his gaze riveted on the seat in front of him, his eyes troubled. She turned her palm up to lace her fingers with his and wondered if the flight was getting to him. There was little turbulence, but she knew he hated to fly.

"I think Rory's pregnant," Luke said quietly. When she didn't gasp in shock, he shifted his gaze to hers. "You know."

"Yesterday morning," Lorelai confirmed. "After our first wedding. I wasn't keeping it a secret. I just didn't want it to ruin yesterday for us. When did you figure it out?"

He gave her a wry smile. "Yesterday morning while the two of you were still at the square. I was restless, so I collected the trash and accidentally knocked over the can in Rory's bathroom. She didn't hide the tests well at all. I didn't want to ruin yesterday for us either."

"Huh," she said.

"I uh …" Luke's cheeks flushed red, and she thought it adorable that at age 51 he could still do that as easily as when he'd been in his 30s. "I saved one. You know, just in case she wants it one day. I mean, I didn't actually _touch_ it. Shoved a hand in a Ziploc bag and picked it up, turned it inside out and left it on top of the fridge. Otherwise it'd be kind of weird, you know? But, I still think she might want it one day. Or not. She can decide."

Lorelai leaned into him, pressing her cheek against his shoulder. The nature of the lie-flat seats they sat in prevented her from lifting the armrest to properly snuggle into him, but this would do for now. "You old softie," she said fondly.

* * *

The shared secret allowed them to put it on the back burner for the duration of their trip, as they toured wineries, woodworking shops, and quite a few markets. But every so often, they see a baby in a stroller or a display of tiny, tiny clothes, and they remember.

They were in Pisa when it came back up again, as they basked in the afterglow of making love, because they really can't keep their hands off each other.

"I should write a book about this," Lorelai said, absently doodling with her finger over Luke's chest. "Y'know, busting all the myths about sex in your 40s and 50s, because husband of mine, I think it's gotten _better_."

"Maybe a little less athletic," he pointed out.

Lorelai smacked his arm. "Says the man who pinned me up against a door three days ago. Don't sell yourself short. Look at those arm muscles." She proved her point by squeezing them.

"But I _have_ changed," Luke replied a little self-consciously. Lorelai only grew more beautiful with age, but him … despite his ridiculously healthy diet and physical job, his genes had started to catch up to him in his mid-40s. For the most part, he didn't care. His doctor insisted he was as healthy as the proverbial horse and that the extra weight actually wasn't so bad. But every so often, especially when he caught sight of pictures of himself from a decade ago, he was reminded that he was looking more like his father every day.

Luke's midlife crisis had come in what Lorelai referred to as the great hair incident of 2014, when he found himself undergoing a hair restoration procedure to try to halt his receding hairline. Some men bought cars, others took on a lover, he went for hair. Ironically, the ones who absolutely loved it were Emily and Richard. Lorelai had gone around for days poking at his scalp, and April had insisted on studying it for scientific reasons. Rory asked if she could turn his decision into an essay on the new middle age in adult men, and he very nearly, in a moment of tequila shots and frustration, nearly allowed her to do so. Then he'd come to his senses.

"We've all changed," Lorelai replied simply. "You simply decided to skip the Miracle-Gro and turn your scalp into a Chia pet."

Luke glared at her.

"I may one day admit what I did to my nose."

"I already knew." He tapped said nose. "I saw the bill. Your nose was perfectly fine."

Lorelai pressed a finger to his lips. "We do _not_ talk about these things."

"Yet, you can make fun of my hair," Luke groused.

"Absolutely." Lorelai kissed him. "And now Rory is pregnant."

They fell silent with that, the first proclamation since the plane that yes, this was a thing that was actually happening. It also put an end to the happy afterglow, and Lorelai tossed back the covers to start rooting through their luggage for clear underwear and her pajamas. Luke followed, pulling out his own night clothes where they were neatly folded in his suitcase.

Lorelai sat on the unmade bed after she dressed, fiddling with her hair. "I keep thinking of where I went wrong."

"You didn't go wrong," Luke hotly retorted.

"Clearly I did, Luke. I thought that she'd learned from Dean, from all that pain she caused everyone. But she hadn't. It just repeated itself with Logan and uh … what's his name. _God_. I should remember his name. She dated him for two years! I'd be livid if my mother forgot your name."

"Didn't she call me your diner guy for a couple of years before we started dating?"

"Point," Lorelai conceded. "I didn't say anything this time. What could I say? It's clear _nothing_ I said before got through to her. Oh … _God_. Christopher. She knows what happened with Christopher and somehow maybe she thinks it's OK to…"

"It's not the same thing," Luke snapped. "That was a one-time deal, and you didn't go there to deliberately cheat on me." He took a deep breath and reached back in his mind to the worst year of his life, worse than even the year his dad died. Time and a lot of soul searching had put everything into perspective. "You were hurting. I was hurting. You thought we were finished. He took advantage of you."

"But Luke, I-"

"He _took advantage_ of you," Luke stressed. "God, Lorelai, what sort of guy does that? We've been over this. You went over this again with that therapist. You didn't give clear consent, and in my mind, he as good as raped you."

"No, you can't-"

"Don't tell me what I can feel about what he did!" Luke roared, then dragged his hands over his face and through his hair. "If I'd been less of an idiot back then, I'd seen it right away and we wouldn't have …"

"But it happened, and we can't change that. It's not lost on me that we're where we should have been in 2008, not 2016. Believe me, every time I think of what we missed out on …" Lorelai pressed a hand to her mouth and he looked down at her.

"Aw, geez, c'mere." Luke pulled her to him, wrapping his arms around her waist as she got shakily to her feet. "We're fine. We're really fine. We've been fine for a long time."

"A little bumpy over the last year," Lorelai admitted.

"But we got through it." He sat first this time, and she dropped into his lap. "It happens. It'll happen again."

"Sooner than we'd hope," Lorelai replied, implying the pregnancy.

"Look, what Rory did was different. She chose to sleep with Logan, and she kept choosing to do that. There's a difference between a one-time incident and an ongoing thing." Luke dragged in a breath. "Like Nicole and the Sock Man."

"I raised her better, you know? I … _We_ gave Rory the world, and she doesn't know what to do with it. She was doing so well after she graduated and covering the Obama campaign. Then that stint with the White House press corps and the Washington Post. But ever since she got laid off a few years ago, she hasn't known what to do with herself. I look at my little girl and see her wandering further and further away from me, and I don't know how to bring her back."

"I think she's starting to get there," Luke said firmly. "Look at Jess. He had to hit bottom before he really pulled it together."

"I thought we were there when she took that semester off Yale."

"Lorelai." Luke wrapped a strand of her hair around his finger. "Rory's been incredibly lucky in the grand scheme of things. I lost my mom when I was a kid and my dad when I was just out of college. You left home at 17 with a baby. Jess had to deal with Liz before she put her life back together. Rory didn't have anything like that to go through. Until last year, she still had both her grandparents. We had to grow up young. She didn't. Maybe this pregnancy is the thing she needs to put her back on the right track."

Lorelai kissed his nose. "You old softie," she said. "You have such faith in Rory."

"And in you. You're a good mom. You've done the best that you could."

"I should have said something when I found out about Logan."

"What could you do? The outcome would be the same as it was 12 years ago with Dean. At least now, Rory came to you. To us. We'll help her, Lorelai. We won't be your parents."

"No," Lorelai agreed. "We won't be my parents."

She leaned into Luke, then gave him a small smile. "I may have bought the baby a tiny baseball cap when we were in Rome."

He flushed. "I may have bought the baby a bottle with coffee cups on it in Venice."

They laughed, and for the first time, they began to plan.

* * *

It turned out not to be an issue in the end.

"Do you want us to come home?" It was the first thing Luke heard the next morning, caught in that dreamy half-state between sleep and awareness. For a moment he wondered if he was still caught up in a dream. But considering said dream involved Kirk in a cow suit, he hoped it wasn't. He rolled onto his side to see Lorelai sitting at the window, her iPhone in hand as she spoke in hushed tones. He rubbed his eyes as her tear-filled gaze met his, and it suddenly hit him. Something was wrong. Very wrong.

Luke shoved back the covers as Lorelai set the phone on the table, tapping the speaker button.

"No, I'm fine," Rory said, her voice filling the room. "Really, I'm fine. It just was like a period; you know? I went to the doctor yesterday and … well that was that." Her laugh was bitter. "Oh my God, I'm such a horrible person, Mom. But I'm just _relieved_ , you know?"

"Rory," Lorelai said helplessly, and Luke stood behind her, squeezing her shoulders hard.

"I never even told Logan. I guess I don't have to now."

"I think you should," Lorelai said quietly.

"Anyhow, I thought you two should know," Rory continued, either not hearing Lorelai or choosing to ignore her. Neither one of those options really sat right with Luke. It didn't fit with the Rory he'd always known, or thought he had known. "Did you want me to pick you up from the airport on Thursday?"

"Sure, kiddo, that'd be great." Lorelai forced cheer into her voice.

"Great, I'll see you then! Love you both!" Rory disconnected the call, leaving the room in a hazy silence.

"I think you can guess what happened," Lorelai said huskily, her hand reaching over her shoulder to close over his.

"It happens," Luke replied, thinking back to a dark day in 2009 when Lorelai had started bleeding and didn't stop. They had rushed to the emergency room only to find that the pregnancy they'd just found out about the night before had ended. His dreams of having a child with her died that day. The pain was so great that they didn't talk about it, not even during the surrogacy talk earlier that year. "Are you OK?"

Once upon a time, she would lie and say she was. Now Lorelai just shook her head. "No, I'm not. Are you?"

"No," Luke replied and wrapped his arms around her. He closed his eyes and silently mourned the grandchild he wouldn't have and the daughter who had lost her way to the point where she was unrecognizable.

* * *

Two months later, Luke was looking for something Lorelai had stashed on top of the fridge when his hand closed over the Ziploc bag he'd stashed up there on their wedding day. He pulled it down and stared hard at it, pangs of grief tearing at him.

Lorelai walked into the kitchen. "Did you find-" Her voice cut off at the sight of the pregnancy test in his hand.

"I should uh … throw this away," Luke said, embarrassed. He moved to the garbage can.

"No!" Lorelai yelled and he froze, the lid halfway open. She took a deep breath and held out her hand. "I'd like to keep it. Please."

Luke handed it over and followed her upstairs. He leaned against the doorway as Lorelai pulled open the bottom drawer of her jewelry box and pushed the Ziploc to the far back, where he knew another pregnancy test was stored. He fidgeted, jiggling his keys in his pocket as she pushed the drawer shut and gave him a half-smile. He held open his arms to her, and she stepped into them. They stayed like that for several minutes, drawing comfort and strength from each other.

"I was thinking," Luke said after a moment, his stomach jumpy and nerves causing him to stutter, "you know about the whole thing with adoption and surrogacy?"

"Yeah?"

"Well … um … I've been thinking. Since this happened. Well, really since last year, but especially since Rory … I was wondering what you thought of foster kids."

Lorelai jerked back in surprise. "Foster kids?"

"Yeah. Like, you know, helping out kids with nowhere else to go, like you with Rory, or like Jess." Embarrassed, Luke started to turn away. "Nah, forget it, it's a crazy idea and …"

"No!" Lorelai grabbed him before he could leave, pulled at his arm until he turned back. "It's not a crazy idea. I love it."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Luke thought her smile was brighter than the sun, but later Lorelai told him that his answering smile rivaled the stars.


End file.
